New Day In Land Of The Rising Sanae

As Japan’s parliament elected Sanae Takaichi as the nation’s first woman PM, to focus solely on her gender is missing the earthquake for its tremor. Her elevation to PM and Oct 4 victory in her Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) leadership race has not shattered a glass ceiling as much as it has the post-war consensus of cautious pacifism that’s defined Japanese foreign policy for decades.
Takaichi’s election as PM signals the arrival of an uncompromising Japan – one that’ll be far more assertive, more militarised and far less willing to apologise for pursuing what its new leader defines as ‘national interest’. The internal party election after LDP suffered its worst electoral showing in over a decade became a showdown between Takaichi, aligned with the late Shinzo Abe’s faction, and Shinjiro Koizumi, son of former PM Junichiro Koizumi.

In the final runoff, Takaichi won by 185 votes to 156.